The Business Case for Open Source Software

An anonymous reader writes "An InfoWorld blog entry makes a business case for open source software, and attempts to explain the business benefits of OSS to management and business owners. The primary benefits the piece uses to argue in favor of OSS include no licensing fees, and no license keys. The article also argues that OSS results in freedom from 'ownership' by software vendors. 'Never again will you fear the BSA (Business Software Alliance) knocking on your door wanting to perform a software audit. The BSA even takes out advertisements on Google search pages for and up to $200,000 reward a disgruntled ex-employee can receive for reporting your company to the BSA! That's quite a powerful motivator...'"

Comments

You're off the mark in either case

[HangingChad]

I probably wrongly singled out the EFF, whereas I probably meant the FSF.

Your comparing apples and oranges in either case. The choice to use open source software as part of your development process begins early on. Linksys didn't wake up one day and discover GPL code in their router firmware. They made a conscious decision to use GPL code as a base to cut development costs early on, knowing full well what the license terms required. Later they decided improvements and modifications were "theirs" and they didn't have to give anything back.

The alternative is to pay the money up front and write your code from scratch. They knew exactly what they were doing, I've heard other companies saying the same thing. Line usually goes something like, "We won't put it out there. Let them sue us, we can always settle and bury a copy of the source code somewhere on the server it's hard to find." Because there are no monetary damages involved, some companies feel like they can use open source code and later play hardball with the open source community about releasing changes.

So, yes, when you start your project with open source code...all your base belongs to us. It's not a secret, you know that starting out. And if you discover later that one of your programmers has been gun decking their contributions by copying open source code, you have the option of removing their contributions...and if you can't separate their contributions you shouldn't be in the software business anyway...and pay for a rewrite. That's the way OSS works. It's not a secret. There are options if you don't like the deal. Because some companies are going to be dickheads and go to court before they'll release changes doesn't mean it's anything like the proprietary enforcement model.